The invention relates to an electric shaver including at least one electromotor arranged in a housing and a shaver head as well as an adjustably arranged long-hair cutting system or trimmer and an actuating switch.
Electric shavers, usually, comprise a plurality of different cutting systems. Besides oscillating blade blocks which cooperate with shaving blades, various other cutting systems and, in particular, long-hair cutting systems are known. Trimmers or long-hair cutting systems are usually displaced by means of an actuating switch into a position in which they become active, long-hair cutters arranged to be foldable out of the plane of the housing and connected with the oscillation drive being known as well.
Such long-hair cutting systems in which the cutting tools cooperate with a comb comprise known configurations including displaceable skin protecting elements in order to reduce the risk of injury and the risk of damage to the blades. Such a long-hair cutting system is known from WO 98/07550, comprising a cutting edge formed by the cutting teeth of an upper cutter as well as a lower cutter, relative to which a skin protecting element is displaceable by the aid of a separate actuation member. By actuating this separate actuation member, the skin protecting element may, thus, be placed into a position in which the upper edge of the skin protecting element is adjacent to the cutting teeth, and into a position in which the cutting teeth lie bare, thus exerting a better long-hair cutting effect.
The invention aims to provide an electric shaver of the initially defined kind, which enables a plurality of operating positions to be assumed by means of a common actuating switch, and by which, in particular, both the function of a second shaver head and the function of a long-hair cutter can be realized by a single long-hair cutting system or trimmer without the latter requiring additional cutter heads. To solve this object the configuration according to the invention essentially consists in that the actuating switch is mechanically coupled with the trimmer for movement in the same direction and the trimmer is displaceable from a first, resiliently mounted operating position into a second, further extended position, and that a trimmer part serving as a skin protecting means is entrained in the direction of displacement as far as to a stop over a displacement path that is shorter than that of the trimmer. Due to the fact that the actuating switch is mechanically coupled with the trimmer for movement in the same direction, various operating states can be directly adjusted by the actuation of the operating or actuating switch, whereby the trimmer, in a first operating position of the trimmer, is resiliently mounted in the housing and can assume the function of a second shaving system. Due to the fact that the trimmer can be moved into a second, further extended position by means of the operating or actuating switch, it is feasible to place the trimmer into a position in which it can be employed as a long-hair cutting system, and due to the fact that a trimmer part serving as a skin protecting means is entrained in the direction of displacement as far as to a stop over a displacement path that is shorter than that of the trimmer during said movement into the second, further extended position, the cutting system of the trimmer is immediately released in a suitably manner so as to provide an effective long-hair cutting system.
In the first, resiliently mounted operating position, in which the trimmer virtually functions as an additional shaver head, the trimmer is preferably elastically deformable just as the shaver head, whereby the configuration advantageously is devised such that the trimmer is resiliently supported in a trimmer housing.
Advantageously, the configuration is devised such that the trimmer carries a T-shaped cutting tool whose T-beam plane extending normal to the direction of displacement, in the first operating position, is held resiliently in a position and substantially coincides with a tangential plane of the shaver head such that in this first, resiliently mounted operating position a substantially plane envelope is formed, which safeguards the contact of the two cutting systems with the skin without requiring a change in the usual handling of an electric shaver. The trimmer is resiliently mounted in its trimmer housing so as to ensure the simultaneous entering into effect of the two cutting systems upon manual pivoting of the shaver in different positions.
In the second operating position of the trimmer, in which the trimmer is to function as a long-hair cutting system, the trimmer is further extended such that in this position merely the trimmer is active, while the skin protecting means is, at the same time, held back in this position in order to appropriately release the cutting teeth and be able to safely seize long hairs. Advantageously, the configuration in this case is devised such that the T-beam plane extending normal to the direction of displacement in the second operating position of the trimmer is located higher than the tangential plane of the shaver head extending parallel to this plane. Since the operating or actuating switch is usually displaced from one position into the next position only over a short path due to the limited housing dimensions and in order to facilitate handling, and the release of the trimmer in the second operating position advantageously calls for a trimmer displacement path that is larger than the displacement path of the actuating switch, the configuration advantageously is devised such that the trimmer is connected with the actuating switch via a transmission gear designed, in particular, as an angle lever. In this manner, it is feasible to extend the trimmer over, for instance, more than 7 mm at a displacement path of the actuating or operating switch of, for instance, only 4 mm and to obtain the appropriate release of the cutting teeth by the simultaneous restriction of the path of the skin protecting means.
In the second operating position, in which the trimmer is to function as a long-hair cutting system, the resilience of the trimmer is no longer desired. Therefore, the configuration advantageously is devised such that the trimmer in its second operating position cooperates in a positive and force-transmitting or frictionally engaged manner with stops that block the resilient movement of the trimmer.
In order to ensure, during the retraction of the trimmer, the safe return of the displacement path caused by the actuation members cooperating with the actuating switch, the configuration advantageously is devised such that the trimmer housing, in its extended, second position, is pressed against springs having spring travels corresponding to the displacement path between said first and second positions. When pulling back the actuating switch, the trimmer housing, by the force of these springs, is thus returned into its original position, in which the resilient suspension and support of the trimmer within the trimmer housing is ensured again.
In order to limit the outward path of the skin protecting means in the first, resiliently mounted operating position of the trimmer, the configuration advantageously is devised such that the skin protecting means is overlapped by an externally arranged comb of the trimmer. The externally arranged comb overlapping the skin protecting means thus entrains the skin protecting means during the inward movement of the trimmer so as to cause the skin protecting means to reassume its external position relative to the trimmer, in which the risk of injury is reduced. In order to promote the movement of the skin protecting means relative to the trimmer into this starting position, the configuration advantageously is devised such that the part serving as a skin protecting means can be entrained into its external end position against the force of a spring supported on the trimmer. In a particularly simple manner, the trimmer, which is resiliently supported within a trimmer housing, is able to cooperate with the actuating switch via actuating members capable of being displaced in the direction of the force of these springs with the trimmer, such an effective direction of the actuating members at the same time ensuring that, in the outwardly displaced second, further extended position, the action of the springs is blocked and the trimmer is directly supported on the actuating members. In this manner it is safeguarded that no elastic resilience will occur any longer if the trimmer is used in the second, further extended position, thus favoring the use as a long-hair cutting system.
In a preferred manner, the trimmer part serving as a skin protecting means is designed as a comb, wherein a comb may also be arranged on the trimmer side facing the shaver head. The comb arranged on the trimmer side facing the shaver head may, however, be replaced with a hair-raising element comprised, for instance, of lamellae or soft plastic.